Paid Advertisements on Zazzle vs. Marketing Fees

[Jadendreamer13]

Instead of charging marketing fees that are deducted from Zazzle designers’ royalties, Zazzle could offer paid advertisements — like Etsy does — that designers pay for by setting a specific budget that is used on a pay-for-click basis.

This way, Zazzle could generate the extra income they want from paid ads instead of reducing designers’ royalties.

The paid ads would be placed on top of search results with a “Sponsored” notation, and the top-selling products would be displayed under the paid ads.

In this case, it would be a win-win situation — not a win-lose situation, which best describes designers’ current situation.

[CLC]

...you would probably lose money with paid ads.  If there was a pay for advertising available, just like on Etsy the algorhythm  would favor the top sellers and push those products to the front, sellers products that have not sold would never receive any impressions and you would be charged by clicks if someone did click on your ad. You could get 10 clicks at a cost of .70 each and own $7.00 without selling a product....

[Jadendreamer13]

Not every Zazzler would need to purchase paid adds; it would be optional….

[CrazyMermaid]

If a few purchase ads and get top rankings, it stops being optional for people who want to be competitive. The market place would belong to the rich. I also think it looks spammy to have sponsored ads at the top of the market place. It certainly doesn't increase the trust factor.

[Jadendreamer13]

As with anything designers do on Zazzle — like designing, researching, and marketing — running an ad campaign needs to be done strategically and thoughtfully in order to be successful. Setting an ad budget of $20.00 is affordable for most — and again, it’s optional.

[CLC]

If you want to pay to advertise your products there are several options available that would actually get you more exposure than this marketplace and earn you a referral as well, it would also be a good way to test if paid marketing was a viable option for you. I don't think Zazzle would drop the current advertising fee, but just add this option.

[Jadendreamer13]

I think that if we — designers and Zazzle don’t work together to find and establish a win-win solution, then nothing will change.

[Connie]

For sure pay-to-play is NOT a win-win situation! Not all change is good, and being forced to pay to show up in the search results is NOT a good change!

[Wesha]

Exactly ... please no paid ads on Zazzle like Etsy !

[kimmpossible]

I can promise you, the self referral thing is not worth it. I maybe get a couple per day and the rest of my sales are third party, where I am losing thousands per month and maybe getting like $20-$40 per day on self referrals. 

[sanainvi]

Have to evered paid to adverised your products ? I am thinking about doing this , coz i am a noob in this field , so i am not exactly sure about what to do like which plateform to use ? and how much money to put ? its confusing me

[AirTwin]

Try free options first like social media and tiktok/like sites.

Be careful driving paid advertising to any shared marketplace, there are too many "exit ramp" links on the product pages for buyers to click off to another or non-designer link. 

Read forum sections Share Your Tips & Tricks, Promoting, About Affiliate Requests and the sections that deal with this topic. Don't rush doing paid anything if you are new.

[CrazyMermaid]

The etsy sellers I know, don't think of it as optional and they pay a lot more than $20. They feel they have to do it to be competitive. So choice is only if you don't want to make a living from it. 

[Jadendreamer13]

If sellers have established — in their minds — that they have to pay for advertising, then that’s what they will feel compelled do.

Paying for advertising is optional.

This is all about mindset.

“Whether you think you can - or you think you can’t, either way, you’re right.”

[CLC]

...advertising is absolutely essential on marketplaces such as this, it's the only way to get products in front of buyers. Without our artwork showing on products on major search engines we would literally have no views or sales, in house advertising would not be enough, but advertising cost should be configured in the final cost of the product being sold by the maker, not deducted from commissions on artwork by artisans

[tamirazdesigns]

Agree!

[Connie]

If you have a "mandatory-ad-spending" mindset, good for you. There are plenty of places online to pay for advertising, places where your advertising dollars will go a lot further than competing with nearly a million other sellers for the top spots on Zazzle searches. Most of us DON'T want Zazzle to become a pay-to-play fiasco like Etsy!

[kimmpossible]

Again, no. You pay what you want. I have my budget at $1.30 per day and make a great income. The fees are much lower on Etsy and I would love to see Zazzle come closer to those numbers. Zazzle third party sales are eating my income. 

[jophb]

I've tried ads just about everywhere for my other business which was a very targeted audience and market.  It's like throwing money out of an airplane, it goes just about anywhere but where you need it to.  On Pinterest, $20 would disappear in literally seconds : ( 

[kimmpossible]

Totally not true. You still get plenty of traffic without ads. 

[chefcateringbiz]

Bingo - paid advertising is for the already successful, with marketing campaigns in different venues, no matter what industry you're in.

[Fiona]

I will pass this on.

Thank you!

[Connie]

This is a TERRIBLE idea! It favors the top sellers who can afford to spend more on ads, and it's not just a matter of setting a budget and sticking to it.  As demand increases, ads become more and more expensive, and it becomes mandatory to spend more and more to try to get placed favorably in the marketplace.

The current system is much more fair- the more sales we make, the more we spend on the marketing fees, but not until AFTER we have made the sales. And there is the incentive to do more outside marketing to get self-referrals.

Etsy is no longer a trustworthy handmade marketplace, but a free-for-all for all the junk that people can afford to spend ad money on. As a buyer, when I search on there, it takes me forever to find what I need, because I have to wade through row after row of garbage that are tagged with the keywords I'm searching for, relevant or not.

[kimmpossible]

Respectfully, you have this all wrong. Etsy has done a lot of work making their ad system fair. It used to be as you described, but now you set a daily budget for ads if you want them. When I wasn’t advertising, I still saw a lot of traffic. Etsy promotes new items, also, so I see sales a day or two after listing, vs here on Zazzle it can take months. 

Also, third party sales here on Zazzle are taking a huge percentage of our income vs just the $1.00 per day on Etsy. So basically, people in the Ambassador Program are making more money on my items than I am here on Zazzle.

[waterart]

I sure hope Zazzle does not go this route. If anyone is willing to pay for ads, like others have said there are plenty of places you can do that, but please, not on zazzle

[kimmpossible]

We are paying for ads, substantially. Half of my royalties are going towards 3rd party fees right now, therefore my Zazzle income has been cut in half. I am only paying a small amount of advertising fees on Etsy and a listing fee, which is a like 40 cents. Profit margins on Etsy are much higher now, so I am working on promoting Etsy over Zazzle. It’s a shame because I genuinely do love Zazzle and the variety of products. It’s just not worth my time right now. 

[CrazyMermaid]

It is good that you have the option of working on two very different platforms. I want that option as well, because I prefer Zazzle over etsy. 

[kimmpossible]

I prefer Zazzle as well, but now that my income has been cut in half, it doesn’t really make sense to invest my time making less money here. If royalties got back up to where they were a couple months ago, it would be similar to what I make on Etsy. I’m sure it’s different for each seller. I sell invitations, signs, plates, napkins, etc. 

[CrazyMermaid]

I am really tired of people trying to turn Zazzle into Redbubble or etsy. I just want Zazzle to understand that not everyone wants the etsy model implemented here. 

[Bluebird]

I prefer the option to pay for ads rather than face a large marketing fee that takes nearly half of my earnings and cannot be turned off.

[AirTwin]

(about here) It seems to be a Marketplace Fee or Hosting Fee, because they are not actively marketing my designs anywhere.

[Barbara]

---

@AirTwin wrote:

It seems to be a Marketplace Fee or Hosting Fee, because they are not actively marketing my designs anywhere.

---

My view of it is the same as yours. A couple years ago, I saw a single Zazzle commercial on TV, but like many others, I no longer watch TV. I've noticed advertisers are flocking to platforms such as YouTube, but where is Zazzle? The best ads are the ones used to sponsor specific channels, meaning the ads are truly targeted. Again, where is Zazzle? Where is the marketing we're now paying for?

I don't want to pay even more when there's still no proof of concept.

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[AirTwin]

True the old ways of reaching people are gone and it's time for new ways. We should know where we are being promoted. It's funny because even Hilton hotels have a podcast now, why not advertise on there.

[Barbara]

Hilton has a website where they're selling only themselves. Because of my art and craft related interests on YouTube, I tend to see ads for places like Hobby Lobby and Harbor Freight. Unfortunately, I also see scattershot ads for drugs, baby diapers, and mascara, which I endure while waiting for the "Skip" button to pop up. I suspect a lot of companies haven't as yet figured out how best to spend their ad money. The most effective ads are done by those companies that sponsor web sites, the web site owners being paid to advertise either by speaking about the product or allowing product placement. The owner is sent the products free of charge to either talk about or subtly place in the background. Art supply companies have "gotten" me a number of times this way. If I were a young mom, I might be open to Zazzle's party supplies, or if I was into interior decoration, I might be open to their decor. Wedding planning would certainly be right up Zazzle's alley.

I really don't know the entire process of doing these things, but I do know that YouTube is still a wide open opportunity. However, I've no idea what it costs, so maybe it isn't a viable option for Zazzle. Anyway, social media sure doesn't seem to be working well anymore.

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[SimplyDesigned]

There's a lot of stuff going on behind the scenes at YT when it comes to ads. They want to help companies spend their ad budget in the best way possible, so they keep seeing results and spending but it's just not that simple. A better way is to have their marketing teams seek out individual content creators because they already have a curated community but it takes time not every creator is a good fit. A tech YT channel gets reached out to by a computer company, although more targeted means more cost. It hasn't stopped any companies with a good marketing budget from developing relationships with creators that turn into a long-term deal.

"According to new data from Nielsen’s Media Distributor, The Gauge, YouTube claimed a record-breaking 11.1% share of total TV viewership in December 2024. Netflix achieved its joint highest share of 8.5% of TV viewership, influenced by NFL games and its holiday film lineup. Amazon Prime Video accounted for 4.0% of TV watch time, thanks to original content like Red One and MrBeast’s Beast Games. In 2024, YouTube solidified its status as a podcasting market leader overtaking Spotify in the video podcasting space. Spotify is struggling to catch up to YouTube when it comes to video podcasting, despite increasingly trying to integrate video onto the platform." YouTube TV streaming hit record highs in December 2024 - RouteNote Blog

Basically for advertising, video is king over just audio (podcast/radio) and text/pictures on social media. Youtube being on 11% of all TVs in USA is big, plus everyone on PC/mobile. But you can only target so much. This is why a lot of places ask if you want to see personalized ads based on your browsing history, having this on is doing these advert companies a huge favor. You don't have to have it on though. By not having it on you could be a stay-at-home mom and get riddled with Auto Parts/Bass Pro Shop ads. Its annoying when you get and ad but, it's even more annoying when it has nothing to do with you. The ultimate goal for YT and other places is to keep you on their platform for as long as possible so they offer you to allow personalized ads. Which aren't perfect, sometimes I get Spectrum Internet ads in spanish. I don't know spanish but I currently DO use Spectrum LOL)

The previous paragraph was to provide some context for this one. YT has officially rolled out an option for its creators to allow them to opt into a "share you channel metrics with 3rd parties" something they previously have been unable to make happen. If a channel opts into this, all of the advertisers on YT will be able to make more informed decisions about where their ads get placed. Its a win-win. Advertisers spend money more efficiently and letting potential sponsors see more of your data gives them a better idea if they want to reach out for a deal with you. You tech-based channel will have more tech-based ads that viewers will be more willing to sit through, instead of horse grooming tool ads or literally anything non tech.

Doing some digging, here's the Zazzle YouTube there are six 31 second videos they've been using for ads on there most recently. They are wedding, wedding, custom hobby, custom business, custom birthday/occasion. You could probably gleam the info from these and create things that fall into those categories, seems like that's what they are focusing for now. You can go down further and see longer ones like the Barbie one. Pretty much the ones that don't have a cookie cutter "how to" with a PowerPoint looking thumbnail would have been ads. I see they started experimenting with ads around 2 years ago on YT publicly. One titled "Victoria Unboxing Her Wedding Embosser from Zazzle". I still see that one to this day, it shows publicly as their first ad with 328k views. They have experimented with 90 second+ ads, 30 second and 15 second ones.

Just wanted to spread some YouTube knowledge, gonna end this longggg post now by saying anyone should visit the Zazzle YT and you can sort videos to oldest, they have been making videos for a long time and it might do us all some good just to go back in time and see what they were up to then. If only to take our minds off the April 1 changes for a few minutes.

[Barbara]

I miss Zazzle's old-style videos where they discussed new products or new ideas and offered up suggestions with the visuals to support them. As for the newest ones, you said they're using them for ads, but where? Hmm...then again, nothing I watch inspires YT's algorithm to suggest videos that might have a Zazzle ad attached to them. Art, history, a couple of cooking channels, animal stuff, a bunch of podcasts, but nothing that makes me look like a good subject for invitations or decor. Of course, Wayfair advertises to me, but they advertise to everyone, the same as those poison (drug company) commercials.

I use Spectrum too, but the ads in Spanish I get aren't directly from them. Fabreze, for instance.

I haven't noticed anything on Roku's version of YouTube for sharing my personal metrics, which doesn't mean it isn't there, of course. I'll have to look at their "system" section.

That was one looong post, kiddo! LOL

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[SimplyDesigned]

To answer your "As for the newest ones, you said they're using them for ads, but where?" question. Any video that has played on YouTube must be uploaded to YouTube to be shown, even down to the ads. So strictly speaking this is just on there. Nothing holding Zazzle back from buying ads through google or elsewhere and using that same video that's hosted on YT as the ad over there. It's just my opinion but i'm pretty sure YT isn't the only place showing Zazzle ads, video or otherwise.

I too miss that Zazzle doesn't do the videos about new products or show off the Makers. But I feel like those videos being catered towards designers more than customers might be why they stopped. Either not enough numbers for them or just took a lot of time to do maybe, we'll never know. But maybe we can ask the mods to forward a message along asking for it to be brought back. YT is bigger now than ever so it might be worth a chance to try again.

Haha yes! Perhaps my longest post to date here but since I have a lot of YT knowledge, I wanted to be sure anyone here could kinda pick up what i'm putting down because it can truly be a lot. One thing all the recent ads scream: Occasions, Business & Hobbyists. I don't know for sure but if that's what 6 million people combined viewed the 6 most recent Zazzle videos over 3 months, it can't hurt to get into those no matter what flavor designs you have. I figure a video promoting birthday supplies, even though its not YOUR specific designs its still bringing people in searching for custom birthday supplies. So it is a broad win for everyone I feel like, even though we can't tangibly see it.

[kimmpossible]

I am baffled that people would rather pay half their income to third party sales, than a set fee per day - that you can choose. Here on Zazzle I have lost thousands per month to third party sales. On Etsy I pay around $40 per month and that is all!! Not to mention, I receive 20% commission on print orders through Corjl, the editing service I use for my customers. So not only am I receiving a much higher amount per sale on Etsy, I am also getting 20% commission on print orders. I don’t think Zazzle will change its advertising system because they are making way more money claiming third party sales. They don’t even tell us where the sale came from. Also, people in the ambassador program are making 15% (I believe) of each order they refer, making three times more than the designers who spent the time creating and listing each product. I make more money on my self referrals than my actual design royalty. On orders of like $200 I maybe make like $9.00. You guys - this is not working. 

[igiftcenter]

Turn Z into an advertising platform for designers... is a truly bad idea.  This marketplace is hard enough to compete on but once you start changing it over to an Etsy ADV marketplace.... the entire playing field is skewed towards those with more $ in their pockets and those who have the time, knowledge, and strategy to put their products in a favorable marketplace position..... and you can say good bye to a LOT of designers who will fall by the wayside as a result of this. In addition new designer who are just starting out would be discouraged from believing they could succeed against the experienced and those with deeper pockets.  I'm pretty sure Z who is always looking of new / more talent would not want this to be the case.

[Bluebird]

I don't view this as a bad idea. I'm also selling merch on demand, KDP, and Etsy, and I'm still making sales without paying for ads. My focus has been on creating designs that people actively search for and optimizing them for SEO. However, I would prefer to pay for ads rather than lose almost half of my income to marketing fees. My main concern with Zazzle is the lack of growth this year. Despite the time I’ve spent designing and promoting my products, I haven't seen any positive results. Additionally, when I search for Zazzle on Google, I come across these very concerning questions.